The Drama of the Toothpaste Cap

The other night I was doing my pre-bed routine and I dropped the cap to my toothpaste down the drain of my sink.

Dangit.

All the plumbing in my house is a bit ghetto, so there's no guard of any sort on the drain. Just a hole. I gaze forelornly down said hole and wish that I had been more careful. But alas, I had not, so I grab a flashlight from the kitchen and take a closer look.

I can see it, but it's way down there- a little white plastic island on a nasty black tube-river. I look and I think.

How to retrieve the cap? I don't want to clog the drain. And I don't want dried-out toothpaste.

I determine that I need something long, thin, and stiff to reach down there, and something sticky on the end to stick to the cap and pull it up. Hanger. Gum.

I find the only wire hanger in my house, and after much wrestling, realize that the white cardboard tubing across the bottom of the hanger is a better choice than the wire itself.

I head back to the kitchen for a piece of gum, so I can chew it into sticky-ness. En route I have a better idea- peanut butter! The stuff here is really gooey. I grab the jar and the cardboard tube and return to the facilities.

After my first jab at the cap, I realize that the cap is floating in water; not just lying at the elbow curve of the pipe. Hence, each time I try to poke it, it just gets pushed down.

Dangit.

Another brillian plan occurs to me- molasses! I have molasses, and I remember that it is really sticky. A return trip to the kitchen later, I try again, this time with molasses instead of pb. No luck.

Great idea number three: turn on the water full-blast, and hope that the water backs up enough to make the cap float closer to the top of the pipe. I try it.

And suddenly the cap is gone.

Hmm.

Well, I guess that takes care of that! I brush my teeth and head to bed.